few lines will exhibit at once the
false statements and the absolute want of a spark of sorrow--dead,
inanimate words, words, words!

Thus long my grief has kept me drunk:
Sure there 's a lethargy in mighty woe;
Tears stand congealed, and cannot flow.
........
Tears for a stroke foreseen, afford relief;
But unprovided for a sudden blow,
Like Niobe, we marble grow,
And petrify with grief!

DRYDEN'S CONVERSION.--The Duke of York succeeded as James II.: he was an
open and bigoted Roman Catholic, who at once blazoned forth the death-bed
conversion of his brother; and who from the first only limited his hopes
to the complete restoration of the realm to popery. Dryden's course was at
once taken; but his instinct was at fault, as but three short years were
to show. He gave in his adhesion to the new king's creed; he who had been
Puritan with the commonwealth, and churchman with the Restoration, became
Roman Catholic with the accession of a popish king. He had written the
_Religio Laici_ to defend the tenets of the Church of England against the
attacks of papists and dissenters; and he now, to leave the world in no
doubt as to his reasons and his honesty, published a poem entitled the
_Hind and Panther_, which might in his earlier phraseology have been
justly styled "The Christian experience of pious John Dryden." It seems a
shameless act, but it is one exponent of the loyalty of that day. There
are some critics who believe him to have been sincere, and who insist that
such a man "is not to be sullied by suspicion that rests on what after all
might prove a fortuitous coincidence." But such frequent changes with the
government--with a reward for each change--tax too far even that charity
which "thinketh no evil." Dryden's pen was eagerly welcomed by the Roman
Catholics. He began to write at once in their interest, and thus to
further his own. Dr. Johnson says: "That conversion will always be
suspected which apparently concerns with interest. He that never finds his
error till it hinders his progress toward wealth or honor, will not be
thought to love truth only for herself."

In this long poem of 2,000 lines, we have the arguments which conducted
the poet to this change. The different beasts represent the different
churches and sects. The Church of Rome is thus represented:

A milk-white hind, immortal and unchanged,
Fed on the lawns, and in the forest ranged;
Without uns